WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden signed into law on Sunday a measure increasing Social Security pension payments to some retirees who receive public pensions, such as former police officers and firefighters, in what the White House described as the first expansion of such benefits in 20 years .
Last month, the Senate voted to approve the Social Security Fairness Act, which would have repealed two decades-old provisions that can reduce benefits for people who also receive a pension. The House of Representatives approved it earlier.
“The bill I’m signing today is about a simple proposition: Americans who have worked hard all their lives … should be able to retire with economic security and dignity,” Biden said. “That’s the whole purpose of the Social Security system designed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt almost 90 years ago.”
The law reverses a decades-old change to the popular retirement program that was made to limit federal benefits to some higher-income workers with pensions. Over time, a growing number of employees, such as postal workers, also saw their payouts capped.
